


Don't Have Kittens

by Le_Chien_Bleu



Category: The Libertines
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-07
Updated: 2015-11-07
Packaged: 2018-10-31 16:59:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,269
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10903629
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Le_Chien_Bleu/pseuds/Le_Chien_Bleu
Summary: One-shot about Peter and Carl and cats. Future fic/ AU. Light angst and humour, with a fluffy ending.





	Don't Have Kittens

Pairing: Peter/Carl  
Genre: Fluff.  Babylibs to present/future.  
Beta: The miaowtastic [](http://mimioomin.livejournal.com/profile)[**mimioomin**](http://mimioomin.livejournal.com/)  
Notes: One-shot about Peter and cats.

  
**_DON’T HAVE KITTENS_ **

*  
Peter should never be allowed to look after anything.  Give him a bag of sweets to hold and four minutes later all you’ll get in return is a scrunch of sugary paper.  With a sherbet dusted smile.  Books will come back graffitied with stray thoughts and topless French girls (nipples and berets scratched out in biro littering the margins).

Girls are a terrible mistake.  His friend considers unguarded drinks and girlfriends with the same easy entitlement.  He’ll pick them up and wrap his pretty mouth around them before you can blink.  At parties, Carl takes to keeping one hand on his beverage and one on his bird at all times.

Bikes are almost safe because he can’t wrap his ludicrous giraffe legs around them (although he can swap them for shandy and second-hand records faster than you’d imagine).

Money is just asking for trouble.

 _Absolutely not_ , says Carl, when he brings home the kittens.  No.  Nope.  Definitely and completely no way.  But Peter has an uncanny ability to unhear things he doesn’t like.  He coos and fusses, ruffling fur and tickling behind ears, whilst Carl says sensible things like _vet bills, food, litter trays, being a responsible fucking adult_.

Peter gazes at him with chocolate button eyes; he tries not to melt.  Not to be swayed by the bundle of fur that wraps itself around his shoulder, purring violently and hiding in the curtain of his hair.  Not to shiver at the tickle of silky fur against delicate skin.

 _That’s my favourite jumper_ , he says, finally.  As he watches Peter wrap the fluffy critters in his favourite winter knit.  A maroon bobbly thing, hand knitted with all the ineptitude and care of maternal affection; hideously ugly, but the warmest thing he owns.

‘But, Biggles, it’s cold.’  He widens his eyes and blinks fluttery lashes at him.  Carl grits his teeth.  He knows exactly how cold it is, thanks.  He knows it intimately from every morning that he has to peel himself out of the warm cocoon of their bed, dawn still striping the room grey though the broken window.  Pedalling numbly through the winter morning to a job that pays less than a week’s dole.  Leaving Peter mumbling dreamily into his pillow and burrowing back into stolen warmth beneath the covers.

He looks down at the kittens, nesting happily in his favourite jumper.  He resigns himself to defeat.  And possible pneumonia.

‘ _You’re_ looking after them, Pete’ he says.  ‘I mean it.’

*  
Being looked after by Peter is a terrifying prospect.

He builds an elaborate obstacle course from bright balls of wool, snaffled from the nice old ladies at the bingo hall where he occasionally works.  Carl watches the colourful snarls webbing the living room and foretells doom.  But when – twenty minutes later – he has to come and unravel the little ginger one from a tangle of bottle green wool, Peter is so distraught that he can’t bear to say _told you so_.

He settles for petting the mewling kitten and boy, distracting them with the last of the milk and the chocolate he had been saving.  It is quite difficult to mind when they are both snuggled into him on the sofa, boneless and heavy, trapping him in a pile of purring affection.

*  
‘It’s like herding kittens,’ says Peter.  Again.  Carl concentrates on ignoring him.

He had plans for his day off – his _only_ day off, mind – plans that involved rolling over and going back to sleep, followed by a long, _hot_ bath, filled with steaming water from the kettle, wrapping himself up in Peter’s favourite jumper and reading yesterday’s paper from cover to cover, drinking tea and diligently doing nothing.  Spending his precious morning clambering around the house trying to put a cat in a box was not part of the plan.

They move like smoke, flashes of dark fur disappearing around the backs of cupboards, eyes glowing bright beneath the curtains, tip of a tail gliding jaws-like through the banisters.  By the time eight sets of paws are tucked safely in their basket, Carl is covered in claw marks and knackered.  And definitely not speaking to Peter.

His resolve is only strengthened by the very long bus ride to the vets and back again, with a squirming basket of kittens in his lap.  Not even the lure of hot tea and (his own) chocolate hobnobs can break his sulk.

‘Fluffer, tell Carlos that he’s being very silly.’

The tiny grey kitten pauses mid paw-wash to peer up at Carl.  He thinks it is an incredible unfairness that Peter seems to speak cat.

‘Cat, tell Peter I’m still not speaking to him.  And if he thinks he’s sharing my whiskey, he can fuck off.’

The kitten shrugs and ambles off to lick herself in peace.

*  
The kittens turn out to be quite good entertainment.  The telly is broken (as they tend to be when drunken boys flail gangly limbs through them), so Carl needs something to watch.

He likes feeding-time best.  The scrap and scramble of paws, tumbling and tussling for supremacy.  They are delightfully unscrupulous.  On a slow day, he bets against himself on the victor.

He watches closely.  Hoping to pick up tips so that he might finally beat Peter to the last chocolate biscuit.  His friend is naturally gifted with feline powers of persuasion.  Carl loses track of the number of skirmishes that end with him beaten and bewildered.  Finds himself staring into dark eyes, comforting instead of berating.

Carl refuses to name the cats.  _It’s all going to end badly_ , he insists to Peter, _you’ll see_.  So Peter names them thrice over in retaliation.  Ridiculous names.  A string of silly sounds that stream from his smirking lips.

 _Fluffer, Shambles, Dimples, Muddles, Mumbler, Shagger, Shirker, Giggles, Dagger, Dancer, Tickles, Teaser_.

He produces the names interchangeably, tripping off his tongue and landing on whichever feline friend is nearest at the time.  Or, occasionally, Carl when he wants to annoy him.  Although with long fingers brushing the sensitive tips of his hair, hands stroking heat into his skin, soft nonsense words murmuring in his ear, it’s difficult to remember to be annoyed.

He sympathises with the cats, pleasure rumbling through their throats, flopping onto their backs and surrendering to the boy’s gentle torments.

It is all he can do not to roll over and let Peter tickle his tummy.

*  
When they move out, Peter finds new homes for their furry lodgers in the arms of sympathetic girls.  But he has always been good at finding a soft place to fall.  And a pretty girl to dust him off.  Carl is left to find his own lodgings.

The cats sniff around their new owners.  Claim new cushions and favourite jumpers.  Unconcerned.

In maudlin moments, over the coming months, Carl finds himself missing the casual brush of silk on skin.  Missing the company of another breathing body in the sleepless night.

But he misses a lot of things.

*  
The years come and go with feline indifference.  Cosy and comfortable one moment; scurrying away the next.

There are girls.  Carl likes the ones who can fend for themselves, who don’t fuss when he doesn’t come home for days.  They can hunt down their own meals and clear off when they’ve had enough.  Now and then he settles down.  But long nights stretch out and snare him down, making him restless.

He catches glimpses of his best friend – in crumpled black and white pages, tipping his hat from a glossy cover – accompanied by an endless procession of models and cats, all hungry eyes and seductive lines.  None of them seem to follow as he roams from doorstep to doorstep.

*  
He finds himself in the countryside without warning.  Outside a house he has only seen in pictures.  In the middle of the night, shrugging into the collar of his jacket.  It had all made perfect sense when he tumbled into a taxi in the middle of London.  But somewhere along the drive, pressed up against the window as the city lights fade into black, the night’s doubts and chill creep in through the glass.

Now, stranded in the middle of nowhere and much too sober, there is nothing to do but knock on the door.

Carl is greeted by a pair of big blue eyes, peeking around the front door.  He looks up to meet another gaze, darker and more familiar.

 _Reminds me of you_ , says Peter, as the three of them settle in the kitchen.  He bends down to pet the creature slinking around his ankles.  _Turns up unannounced at my door, sniffing around for food, curling up in my bed.  Then morning comes and he’s gone_.

He tries and fails to summon the energy to be offended.  Too sodden with alcohol and drowsiness to bother prickling at the words.

 _Should be more careful who you let in_ , he mutters.

Peter shrugs.  _Always a sucker for strays, aren’t I?_

There isn’t much he can say to that.

*  
A few months later, he wakes up again with blue skies and green fields outside the window.

He lies very still.  Fighting the ache behind his eyes that demands water, reluctant to leave the shelter of the sleeping body wrapped around him.

The bed shifts.  Blue eyes greet him with a single blink of recognition.  The cat looks thoroughly unsurprised to find him there, which Carl supposes is fair enough.

*  
He has always liked looking at Peter.  But it is hard to snatch a moment when the boy’s sticky gaze isn’t on him.  Like trying to catch your own reflection looking away in the mirror.

The living room is dark, lit only by the amber flicker of a cigarette.  Carl lingers in the hallway – woken by the empty sheets beside him, trailing down the stairs still half dreaming.  Feeling suddenly like an intruder.

Peter is painted in shadow, soft lines sketching out the delicate curves of his face.  Eyes smudged large and dark as the night.  Cheeks hollowed as he sucks in twists of smoke.

The shadows coil and shimmy, revealing a sleek shape balanced in the boy’s arms.  He inclines his head to nuzzle the soft ball of fur, which wriggles and arches into his embrace.  Eyes half closed.  Sighing into the gentle affection.

Carl’s eyes close in sympathy.  He knows the soft kiss of skin, the relief of pressing close, breath to breath.   It is the thing that wakes him in an empty bed.  Leaves him gasping in the dark.  Breathless.  Wanting.

*  
‘Alright love, don’t have kittens,’ says Peter.

Which is really very fucking annoying.

Carl has rehearsed all his questions carefully.  All the buzzing, restless words that fill his brain at three am.  Questions that find him at the kitchen table with an empty bottle in the morning light and a crunching sound when he blinks.

It is infuriating, rather like the man whom he has crossed water to shout at.  Screaming on his doorstep like a spurned lover.  All his painstakingly planned words cracking under pressure.  Anger and terror welling up in his throat, sore and choking, threatening to spill over into hot tears.

_Why is this happening to him now?  What is he supposed to do about it?  What the flaming fuckery is his girlfriend going to say?  Where is he going to keep all his guitars?  How is this ever going to work without them both ending up dead?  _

Peter exhales around the cigarette that he isn’t really smoking.  Lighting it out of habit whilst Carl was shouting at him; still bleary eyed, hair sticking up like ruffled fur.  He drags a palm across his eyes.  Reaches over and deposits his cigarette in Carl’s mouth to shut him up.

He holds up one hand and counts the answers off ink-smudged fingers.

‘Because you take fucking ages to cotton on.  Move in, immediately.  Not much, ‘cos I’m pretty sure she’s been shagging your drummer for months.  In the spare bedroom but you’ll have to ask the cats nicely.  We’ll just…. Agree not to kill each other.  And keep an eye out for heavy falling objects.’

Simple as that.

Carl lets himself be taken to bed.  Stands still for Peter to peel away his clothes, gently, like a sleepwalker he doesn’t want to awaken.  Curls into the comfort of sheets that smell like someone else.  Lies quietly in the familiar press of a body that fits around his own like a puzzle box.  Listens to the slow, soothing purr, steady as a ticking watch, from the end of the bed.

*  
The collar is his only stipulation.  Leather, soft and warm under fingertips.  Midnight blue to match the creature’s eyes.  A small gold disc, carefully engraved.

If lost, please return this cat to Mr C Barat & Mr P Doherty, Partners. 112a Teesdale Street.

It is Peter’s cat.  That is what he tells visitors, the postman, anyone who will listen.  But the infernal beast flirts a figure of eight around Carl’s legs, purrs and rubs against him.  Peter just watches and smirks.

Carl is determined to do things properly this time.  No more strays.

He has the cat chipped, a tiny metal tag tucked beneath its skin.  An indelible mark of ownership.  Peter squeezes his hand too tight and sniffs away tears whilst they wait at the vets.  Afterwards, the cat licks its stitches and looks nonplussed.

Some nights, watching the moonlight steal across the bedroom, he wonders if he could sneak a tag under Peter’s skin.  Just in case.

* * *

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